population would probably die out slowly--very slowly. What might
then be the fate of the cotton fields of the Gulf States, who shall
dare to say? It may be that coolies from India and from China will
then have taken the place of the negro there, as they probably will
have done also in Guiana and the West Indies.



CHAPTER IV.

WASHINGTON TO ST. LOUIS.


Though I had felt Washington to be disagreeable as a city, yet I was
almost sorry to leave it when the day of my departure came. I had
allowed myself a month for my sojourn in the capital, and I had
stayed a mouth to the day. Then came the trouble of packing up, the
necessity of calling on a long list of acquaintances one after
another, the feeling that, bad as Washington might be, I might be
going to places that were worse, a conviction that I should get
beyond the reach of my letters, and a sort of affection which I had
acquired for my rooms. My landlord, being a colored man, told me
that he was sorry I was going. Would I not remain? Would I come
back to him? Had I been comfortable? Only for so and so or so and
so, he would have done better for me. No white American citizen,
occupying the position of landlord, would have condescended to such
comfortable words. I knew the man did not in truth want me to stay,
as a lady and gentleman were waiting to go in the moment I went out;
but I did not the less value the assurance. One hungers and thirsts
after such civil words among American citizens of this class. The